


Scars To Your Beautiful

by natgayvanlis



Category: Carmilla (Web Series)
Genre: F/F, Fluff, carmilla is a plastic surgeon, laura is a teacher at a day care
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-06
Updated: 2017-07-06
Packaged: 2018-11-28 11:45:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,121
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11417283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/natgayvanlis/pseuds/natgayvanlis
Summary: It was a quiet night when Laura went to a convenient store to buy something for her dinner, when suddenly four men decides to declare hold up and went to rob the said convenient store where Laura is.Carmilla is just about to end her shift for the night when she got called at the trauma wing.(i'm not good at summaries so it's better if you read)





	Scars To Your Beautiful

**Author's Note:**

> Oops, my mind slipped as I was doing a Grey's Anatomy re-run yesterday and I ended up writing this.  
> I apologize in advance if there are medical terms/procedure I have written incorrect.

 You were just about to end your shift for the night when you were paged at the trauma. It’s weird that you were ask to go down there since you are a plastic surgeon, and as a plastic surgeon your center stage takes place on the third floor of Silas General Hospital.

Anyway, you then chug the remaining contents of your starbucks coffee as you checked on the message from your hospital phone, it was a message from Lafontaine’s intern, Natalie. Lafontaine is SGH’s head of trauma who also happens to be your best friend, which people would normally squint at. When you opened up the message it says that there has been a robbery at a nearby convenient store and one of the victims needs your attention.

Once you have reached the ground floor, where trauma room is located Lafontaine greets you with “Jane Doe, about 25 to 26 years old.” Jane Doe. You’ve always hated it whenever you have to call a patient as Jane or John Doe if they don’t have any ID with them when an accident takes place.

Before you could say anything else, you felt a hand grab at your wrist and you look down to see your patient crying and begging you to save her life. Half of her face was burned, and just by the smell you could say that it was due to a bleach, which was probably thrown to her face during the robbery.

You regarded her with your entire attention by asking her the basic questions you do before you take the patient to your OR; it is a means of assessing for further injury which is not visible.

“Hi, my name is Dr. Carmilla Karnstein”, you introduce yourself. “Do you remember anything that happened before you got here?”

You didn’t get a reply from her; instead she tightens her grip on your wrists. Thinking it must be because of the trauma she went through tonight, you decide on comforting her which by the way isn’t normal to you. You placed your hand on top of hers and reassuring her that there’s nothing to worry about and you got her.

You instructed one of the interns who you never remember the name, which isn’t actually a surprise since you normally give the interns nicknames. “Hey, mousey, can you please book an OR for me stat.” You tell him. You suddenly hear your best friend snicker as you start to walk along your patient’s gurney. “What?” You asked them.

“Nothing, you’re such a classy is all. You call an intern as mousey.”

“Well, it isn’t my fault I don’t remember his name. Plus he kinda does look like a mouse with his ears.”  You counter.

 

**

Before you entered the operating room, you started doing your ritual of preparing for operation. You started by removing your wrist watch which you placed on your drawer. You then step up on the lavatory stand. As you start washing your hands with antimicrobial soap, you take your time to study your Jane Doe as the nurses and your intern SJ starts to prep her. You are certain that she is about your age; even though she is lying you could see that she’s about an inch shorter that you are. Her hair is honey blonde. You suddenly felt yourself getting pity with her, like who wouldn’t?

She was just probably out to buy something from that convenient store and these heartless robbers decides to rob the convenient store and ended up to splash an awful amount of bleach on her face. You cringe as you imagined how it happened. You then continue lathering your arms with soap for about a minute, and after that you thoroughly rinsed it by passing them through the water in one direction.

Once you felt that you have properly disinfected your hands, you turn of the tap and went down from the lavatory stand and enter the operating room, just in time for the anesthesiologist to sedate Jane Doe. You notice her looking at you so you walked towards her and once again assured her “I got you.” You say and she slowly nods her head and you nod your head to your anesthesiologist to let her know that she can sedate her now.

A nurse then started to dress you up with the operating scrub while the other places your black cap. Once it’s done, you walked closer to Jane’s face and took a closer look on her wounds. That was then the only time you realized that some of her tissues where burned too not just the skin and it makes you so angry to whoever did this to her. You did your little silent prayer before you asked your crew “Everybody ready?” and when they all said yes, you answered them by saying “its show time.”

Your procedure lasted two hours since you needed to make sure that you were able to remove all the burned skin and to clean it properly. After that, you made sure to have her face be wrapped neatly with a bandage.

Once her operation was finished, Perry, the resident ophthalmologist came in to get her and have eyes examined. It has been one of the protocols here in Silas General Hospital that once a patient got a damage face due to a burn or fracture, ophthalmologists needs to examine their eyes.

At around two thirty in the morning, you finally went back to the surgeons lounge and you immediately dive on the couch facedown.

You were trying to get settled in for a nap (because you never drive when you are too sleepy) when you heard the approaching chit chat of Laf and their partner Perry. Once inside Laf calls you.

“Carmilla, you up?” Laf asks tentatively.

You turn around to face them. “Was planning to take a nap before you guys came in. What’s up,” You asked as you sat up.

“We finally have a name for our Jane Doe. Her father came in about an hour ago and identified her as Laura Hollis. According to her father, Laura went out to buy something to eat at the nearby convenient store and he notice that it has been an hour and yet she hasn’t come back.” Laf says. “He told us that when he was about to go out and look for his daughter, two policemen came knocking on his house and told him about the incident and that they saw some of Laura’s belongings which includes her IDs with her address.” Laf finishes off.

You didn’t know what to say, so you choose to turn your attention to Perry to ask her about Laura’s eyes. Perry told you that a part of her left cornea was affected so she would need to undergo lasik in an hour to prevent her from getting blind.

“I should stay.” You insist. “Just in case you would need me.”

Perry shakes her head no. “Go home Carmilla. You need to rest. W'ell update you as soon as we can and I’m sure there’s nothing I can’t handle with this operation.”

Perr’s right, Carmilla. Go home and get some sleep.” Laf says.

“Fine. But you call me if you ever need anything.” You tell them before you exit the room. You are wide awake now after the chat you had with Laf and Perry so you know you won't fall asleep as you drive home.

**

The following day, you were called in earlier on the hospital and according to your intern SJ, eversince your patient Laura woke up, all she does is to look for you.

You freaked out when you entered her room as you see her tied up on her bed. “SJ” you called out to your intern pointedly, “Why is she tied up?” You asked raising your voice a little. Before SJ could speak a man cleared out his throat and tells you it was his decision to have her restrained.

“And who are you?” You ask politely yet authoritatively.

“I’m Sherman Hollis. Laura’s dad.”

“Dr. Carmilla Karnstein. I was the plastic surgeon who handled your daughter’s case”. You tell him.

“Glad to finally meet you, Doc.” He answers you. “I’m sorry to have my daughter restrained. When she woke up awhile ago she wouldn’t stop trying to peel off the bandage on her face no matter how I stop her, that is why I decided to have her tied up.” He explains. “She had been looking for you when she woke up earlier.”

“Oh right. I was actually informed by SJ about it.” You say.

“Is she gonna be alright?” Mr. Hollis says.

“I would like to be honest with you. The burn on her face had caused too much damage on both her skin and her tissues. It had actually taken me two hours to do the procedure, and as of this very moment I can’t tell you yet if there will be no complications but what I can promise you is that we'll provide her a close monitoring. Not just with her skin but as well as her left eye.” You explained.

“Her left eye?”

Before you could speak again, Laura starts to stir from the hospital bed and was obviously waking up. You watched her every movement and you almost laughed when you saw her struggle with her restraints, so you decide to walk over to her.

“Hi Laura.” You say softly but just enough to get her attention and when she looked up, you continue to speak. “I’m Dr. Carmilla Karnstein. I did the operation for you last night-”

“Yeah, I do remember you. I also remember you telling me that I’ve got you. And-and I trusted that.  But look at me now, covered with bandage." Laura says, anger and sadness evident in her voice.

“Laura, sweetie. You don’t need to be rude to your doctor. I’m sure she did everything she could.” Mr. Hollis says, trying to comfort his daughter.

Suddenly, the machine that had been monitoring Laura starts to beep, and she also started seizing.

“What’s going on?” Mr. Hollis asked, panic evident in his voice.

“I need help here, now!” You yelled and immediately nurses came to help.You started assessing Laura when you noticed that her BP was dropping. You kept on replaying in your head the procedures you did last night, wondering what could have caused the seizure; you then remember that it could have been caused by the bleach she had inhaled during the incident.

As a protocol, you decided to order a CT scan just to be sure everything on her brain is clear.

Momentarily, you forget about Laura’s father, up until he asked you once again what was going on.

“As of now Sir, we still don’t know what could’ve caused Laura’s seizure, but I am guessing it was because of the bleach she had inhaled. I have ordered a CT scan to check and to make sure that nothing else is affected.”

“If there is?”

“We’ll make sure to work on it as fast as we can. I’ll be the lead in your daughter’s case; I’ll make sure she stays alive.” You promise Mr. Hollis before you finally moved out to follow Laura and your team upstairs at the CT scan laboratory.

When you got there, you release the breathe you didn’t know you were holding as you see your sister, Mattie being in charged.

Mattie isn’t just part of the board of the Silas General Hospital but in fact she is also the head of the Neuro department.

“Mattie” You call her out as soon as you got there.”

“I heard she is your patient.” Mattie responds to you.

“Yes, she came in here last night.” You tell her.

“What happened to her?” Mattie asks. You know she wasn’t just asking now as a doctor but as your sister as well.

“She was one of the victims of the robbery from the nearby convenient store. Some bastards decide to throw bleach on her face. Probably to shut her up or something.”

The scans were finally up and it shows Laura has a burned lungs and a small blood clot on her brain. “Good job sis, you were able to catch on this as early as you can.” She tells you.

**

You and Mattie prepped for the operation. She had ask you to join her because she knows damn too well that you get so hands on when it comes to your patients.

“Do you think she’ll make it?” You ask Mattie.

“Of course she would. Why you asked?”

“I don’t know. I’m just worried you tell her.”

“Well, there’s nothing to worry about. We got this.” Mattie says.

When you both entered, you see that Dr. Callis, the general surgeon of SGH is already there.

You have all started to work on Laura’s operation immediately. Mattie starts drilling a hole on her head to remove the blood clot, as Mel starts to open on the lower right part of her chest and starts to save her lungs. “BP’s dropping.” You heard one of the nurses says. “We need more blood too.” She says.

You tentatively grabbed her hand when Mel calls you, “Dr. Karnstein, would you like to assist me here?” She asks. Good thing, that aside from being a plastic surgeon, you also have a practice when it comes to general surgery so you ask her how you can help.

“Assist me with the suction, and after that, work on massaging her heart. Slowly and carefully, we have to do this to prevent it from stopping. Her body is currently on too much stress and one wrong move, she might crash.” Mel explains to you.

You begin with doing the suction and you waited until Mel tells you to start with massaging her heart, as Mel works on her lungs.

Unfortunately, Laura still crashes; and panic starts to boil up on you.

“What did I do?” You asked.

“Carmilla, listen to me. This isn’t your fault, it’s just her body reacting to the procedure we are doing. Now, please step aside as I’ll work on reviving her. Mel says and you do as you were told.

After a few minutes, Laura went back and she was now stable as Mel prepares to close her up, but then she was being paged on the next operating room.

“You think you can close her up?” Mel addresses the question to you. You nod your head yes.

You start closing her up when you heard Mattie say 'success'. Indicating that she was able to drain the blood clot on her brain without causing any further damage. Mattie had started closing up her skull again and she tells you, “I told you, sis we’ve got this.” And all you can do is to smirk.

 

**

After Laura’s operation, you weren’t able to visit her again since you became way too busy with your job. Besides, the last time you spoke to her you remember her being mad, so you decide on not visiting her.

As you passed by the gift shop in the hospital, you see a stuffed toy in a shape of cupcake and you couldn’t help but be reminded of Laura, so you decide on buying it for her. “Maybe it’s time to visit her.” You tell yourself.

So after you bought it, you went to drop by on her room. As you were about to enter her room, you see a tall guy inside talking to Laura, probably her boyfriend and it was so weird that you suddenly felt jealous seeing him making her laugh.

You entered the room and interrupted them “Careful with too much laughing, your wounds are still fresh.” They were both startled when they heard your voice.

“Sorry” Laura says in between giggles. “Kirsch was just making a joke here.”

“Well, tell your boyfriend to loosen up the jokes.”

“Wha- I’m not her boyfriend. Ew.” The guy, Kirsch says. “We’re just best friends.”

“Oh” You say.

“Nerd Hottie, is she the super hot doctor you were telling me?” Kirsch asks Laura.

And you really couldn’t tell if Laura was blushing or if it was the redness of her skin that you could see.

“Yes Kirsch. That’s her.” You hear her answer. “Although, I hope you didn’t tell her that right in front of her she might think I’m a weird.” When you heard of this, you were sure that even you yourself were blushing.

“Oh no, don’t worry.” You tell her. “I get that all the time some are even indecent proposal from old patients.”

“Yikes” Laura says. “So yeah, anyway, Kirsch isn’t my boyfriend, because I’m very gay.” She admits.

“Well that makes us two.” You tell her.

You have forgotten about Kirsch for a while, up until he decides to whistle at the encounter he witnessed between the two of you.

“Hey L. I’m going to go get something to eat. Want anything?” Kirsch asks.

Laura tells him to get her a chicken sandwich and a salad before he took off.

“Hey.” Laura greets you again when it was just the two of you.

“Hey. You respond and you remember what was inside the paper bag you’ve been holding. “Oh, I almost forgot. I got you this when I passed by the gift shop.” You say as you passed her the gift bag.

“A cupcake, huh?” Laura gives you a questioning look.

“Well yeah, I don’t know but it just reminded me of you.”

You have both settled to a comfortable talk, where you try to get to know each other. You also gave Laura a run through of her health condition and of all the procedures you went through.

“So you’re telling me, you massage my heart while I was on the table?”

“Yes”

“Aw, that’s nice.” Laura says a she dramatically clutches her heart.

“Well yeah, except for the part where your heart decides to stop beating.”

“That’s probably the effect you got on me.” Laura jokes.

You were about to counter, when you were both interrupted by Kirsch and two policemen.

“Hey L, I heard these two officers looking for you at the nurse’s station and I offered to bring them here.”

“Hi, Ms. Hollis.” One of the police introduces himself. “I’m Officer Luce and this is my partner, Office Howard. We’re here to ask you a few questions about the robbery you were involved.”

Laura glances at you as if asking for your go signal and you nod at her.

“Is it okay if we let Kirsch and Dr. Karnstein to stay here as you do your interrogations?

“Of course.” Officer Luce says.

“Thank you.” You hear Laura say.

“Let’s start by asking you what you were doing at the convenient store.”

“Well, I went out to go buy some dinner because I got a little hungry after finishing my take home work. So when I got there, I went to look for something to eat and after that, since I was already there, I decided to look for the bleach which I would be using for cleaning at home.

Then I heard people screaming and I immediately got scared when I saw four gunmen.” Laura’s voice starts to crack reliving the incident. “I stood there on the aisle alone, and one of the gunmen approached me, he was probably checking if everyone was staying still after they have declared “nobody moves” and when I saw him I started crying and I panic that I dropped by wallet and phone on the floor. When he approached me I threatened him that I know how to do Krav Maga and that if he ever goes near me I’m gonna hit him with the gallon of bleach.”

As you listen to Laura’s story, you couldn’t help but to hold her arm, to show her you’re there and she’s safe now.

“I don’t know what else have happened, the next thing I know is that I was screaming because of the burning I felt on my face and I also heard gunshots.”

“Yeah, about three victims were dead. One of those is the robber.” Officer Howard says.

“We are actually thinking that you’ve been on a tug of war with the gunman you have encountered, and probably he was able to grab on the gallon of bleach you were holding on and when you start to defend yourself that was probably the time he splashed its content on your face.” Officer Luce explains.

“I think we have everything covered for tonight. We’ll let you know if we find progress about the robbery. We are now on hunt of the three other gunmen.”

“Do you have a lead already of who this could be?” Kirsch asks.

“We actually do have now. We are thinking that this could be Straka’s gang. They are a notorious team when it comes to this kind robbery.” Officer Howard explained.

After the officers left, you excused yourself telling them you have to do your rounds.

Once again, you haven’t seen Laura for the next two days because you were too busy.

On Saturday, you dropped by again to her room. It’s the day when she would be released from the hospital.

“Ready to go?” You ask her.

“Yeah. Although I’m a little upset I wouldn’t be seeing your face everyday.” She tells you frankly, and she explains she loves seeing from afar as you do your job.

“Well, the good news is, after four weeks you’re going to come back here so we can check on the healing of your skin.”

“I’m excited.” Laura teases you.

You signed her release papers then and you tell Mr. Hollis to keep her skin clean all the time and to change the bandage at least twice a day.

You also remind Laura to apply the cooling gel, as soon as they remove the bandage and to free her face from bandage for at least thirty minutes before applying the new one. When everything was all set, the father and daughter decides to leave.

You were about to head back to the surgeon’s lounge when you hear Laura call out your name. You turn around and see her jog towards you and she ended up giving you a bone crashing hug and a kiss on your cheek. “Thank you, Carm.” She tells you and you won’t deny it, the nickname surprises you. “For everything.”

And you felt her slip something on your coat, and once she was out of sight you pulled out the piece of paper where she messily wrote her phone number.

 

**

Ever since Laura left the hospital both of you have fall on a flirty banters through texts and even on calls. She’s also consistent on asking you even for a coffee, but you usually decline because technically she is still your patient.

Thankfully, she understands that. She also told you the other day that her therapy already started. She also told you that she didn’t want to undergo therapy but you and her father have both suggested it so she agrees on that.

Sometimes, during your late night shifts you would receive a call from her or from Sherman telling you that Laura had a nightmare again of what had happen to her during the robbery.

Every time they tell you that, you would normally insist on going to her place to comfort her or something, but Laura would decline your offer because Laura doesn’t want you to have the trouble of walking in the middle of your shift going to their house. So you settle talking to her until she falls back to sleep, that is if you are not operating.

Every day, you also tell her that she’s still very beautiful even if she’s covered with scar and she tells you sorry that she finds it hard to believe and you understand her.

 

You find it funny how you both settle on this kind of routine where you both check on each other all the time. Through these conversations you also found out little things about each other. Like Laura is 3 years younger than you are which makes her 26 and she teaches at a day care.

When she told you about her job, you found yourself liking her more than you should. There was even a time when she told you she worries about her scar never disappearing as it might scare of the kids she was teaching. So you have promised her that when she returns to the hospital, she will undergo skin graft wherein you would need to take out few pieces of her skin from her thigh and to transfer it to her face so that the scars will disappear and will totally heal.

She agrees on that, the problem though is that they didn’t have enough money for that procedure, so you tell her not to worry because you will find a way.

So here you are, standing outside Mattie’s office to ask her for a help about a pro bono operation. You raise your fist to knock on her door. After two knocks, you hear her say “Come in.”

“Can we talk?” You ask your sister tentatively as you take a seat on one of the maroon chairs inside her office. Talk about all shades of red and you would see it with Mattie.

“What do I owe you this visit, Kitty cat?” She asks you.

“Well uh.”

“Carmilla, darling. You know how much I hate it when people don’t go directly to what they want to tell me, so just spill it.”

“Okay, here it goes.” You discuss everything you are planning for Laura even the part where she tells you she doesn’t have money to spend for skin graft and you tell Mattie that you need her help for pro bono operation. Mattie told you that normally, it’s your Maman who you should be talking to about this, but she also tells you that it was best that you told her instead of Maman.

Mattie have told you to give her at least 24 hours to review the hospital’s budget, and she will let you know tomorrow, the day before Laura comes back to the hospital if she can offer the pro bono. Mattie also gives to the assurance about not worrying about anything because she is confident that the hospital has enough fund, she just needs to study which department the budget would be coming from.

You offer to take it from your department since the procedure is for plastic surgery but Mattie hesitated, telling you your department is low on budget so she might be getting it from her department instead.

You were about to leave Mattie’s office when she tells asks you if Laura makes you happy and you tell her that she does, but Mattie also warns you of the consequences of dating a patient. You reminded her that you know that and you and Laura are both willing to wait until she is no longer your patient.

Friday came and it’s the day you would be seeing Laura again. You kind felt nervous about seeing her again which is really pretty weird.

When you arrived at the hospital, you see that she’s already on a hospital room. The same room where she was confined before.

“Hey, cupcake.” You greet her.

“Carm! “ She lights up as soon as she sees you.

You started discussing to her and her dad all the procedures you have told Laura over the phone. You also showed her a 3D copy of how her face would look again once the scars were removed.

She ended up sobbing with joy after you told her that she didn’t have to pay for anything since Mattie have agreed and gave you the go signal to use a pro bono operation.

“Carmilla, thank you very very much.” Sherman tells you when he envelops you to a hug.” My daughter tells me that you are not a hugger, but right now, Carmilla Karnstein, I need you to hug me back.” And you did, you gave him a hug.

You see Laura still crying and you tell her to stop, and you reminded her that you got her. Once she had calm down, you tell her that you will now have her prepped for her skin graft procedure which may take an hour.

The procedure went well as expected. You were able to clear out all the scars in Laura’s face down to her neck. No trace at all. You also fixed the scar on her lower chest, the part where Mel opened up to have her lungs fixed. You almost tear up the moment you have finished. You know this was all Laura ever wanted.

 

**

Fast forward to two months after Laura’s final operation, you were lying on the couch at the surgeon’s lounge when you hear a knock. Thinking it was probably Laf, you tell them to come in.

When the door finally opens, you see a beautiful girl with a blonde hair who is giving you the most adorable smile. It was Laura. You almost forgot about your dinner with your girlfriend tonight.

You have been dating her for a month now, and it’s still the best thing that ever happened to you.

You sat up to properly look at your girlfriend who is wearing a green dress that hugs her entire body and you gulped as you see how perfect her body is.

“Like what you see, Dr. Karnstein?” She asks you playfully as she moves towards you, and you forgot how to breathe when Laura decides to seat on your lap.

“Yes.” You croaked out. You apologized to her that you almost forget about your dinner tonight and explained to her you had a busy shift and she tells you its okay and there’s no need for you to worry as she starts sucking the pulse point on your neck. You slowly yet demanding pulled her by her hair to give her a proper kiss on the lips. After a nonstop make out session with your girlfriend, you finally pulled away from her to have a quick shower and to change and after half an hour, the two of you left Silas General Hospital hand in hand going to your dinner date.

You couldn’t help but to smile as you both entered the elevator.

“What?” Laura asks you.

“Nothing.” You tell her as you hug her from behind. “I’m just really lucky that you are my girlfriend.”

“Me too.” She tells you, "but right now I’m really starving" and you both burst into laughter at Laura’s admission.

 

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thoughts?


End file.
